The federal government\u2019s move to reschedule marijuana \u201csupports the rationality\u201d of the overall law prohibiting cannabis, attorneys for the Justice Department argued in a court hearing on Wednesday. But both DOJ and major marijuana companies suing the government to try to block enforcement against their in-state activities generally agreed that rescheduling doesn\u2019t largely impact the case at hand.<\/p>\n
The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts\u2019s Western Division held the hearing to take oral arguments days after granting the marijuana firms\u2019 request to make the hearing accessible to the public and press<\/a>.<\/p>\n The\u00a0suit against the federal government\u2014Canna Provisions v. Garland<\/em>\u2014is being led by multi-state operator Verano Holdings Corp.<\/a>\u00a0and the Massachusetts-based cannabis businesses Canna Provisions and Wiseacre Farm, along with Treevit CEO Gyasi Sellers. Plaintiffs are represented by the law firms Boies Schiller and Flexner LLP and Lesser, Newman, Aleo and Nasser LLP.<\/p>\n Litigator David Boies\u2014whose list of prior clients includes the Justice Department, former Vice President Al Gore and plaintiffs in the case that led to the invalidation of California\u2019s ban on same-sex marriage\u2014is leading the suit.<\/p>\n Both parties were given an opportunity to address the standing and merits of the case amid the Justice Department\u2019s pending motion to dismiss the suit. A DOJ lawyer contended that the businesses have not been directly harmed by the policy of prohibition, while defending the rationality of the existing law under the Controlled Substances Act (CSA). Plaintiffs disputed that position, pointing out that the ongoing risk of prosecution\u2014as well as banks\u2019 reluctance to service marijuana businesses\u2014underscores the injury they\u2019ve incurred.<\/p>\n Boies himself presented the plaintiffs\u2019 case. He cited \u201cinconsistencies\u201d in federal enforcement, with the government generally taking a hands-off approach to state programs but also noted situations such as the Drug Enforcement Administration\u2019s (DEA) threats against Georgia officials if they seek to implement their own unique medical cannabis law allowing distribution through pharmacies.<\/p>\n Judge Mark G. Mastroianni, an Obama appointee, also seemed to tentatively accept part of the plaintiffs\u2019 argument that they have standing in the case because prohibition adversely impacts marijuana businesses\u2019 ability to access banking services, at least to some extent.<\/p>\n The judge made clear several times throughout the roughly 90-minute heating that he was interested in whether the Biden administration\u2019s recent announcement that it is initiating rulemaking to move cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III of the CSA affects the underlying arguments on either side.<\/p>\n The Justice Department attorney first emphasized that marijuana has not yet been rescheduled because it must still go through the process of public comment and a possible administrative hearing before the rule is potentially finalized. But he said the fact that the process is unfolding \u201csupports the rationality of federal marijuana policy.\u201d<\/p>\n However, \u201cit doesn\u2019t fundamentally change all of the arguments,\u201d he said, \u201cbecause here we\u2019re dealing with plaintiffs who are engaged in recreational marijuana businesses and even reclassifying something to Schedule III doesn\u2019t doesn\u2019t legalize it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI think that this development underscores the rationality of the measured approach that the government has taken, which is to to allow these programs to go into effect to avoid friction between the federal government and the states,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd it allows a body of evidence to develop, which is currently informing the federal government\u2019s decision making regarding marijuana.\u201d<\/p>\n Boies said earlier in the hearing that he agrees a possible Schedule III reclassification \u201cdoesn\u2019t really affect the arguments\u201d because the federal government would \u201ccontinue to assert\u201d that marijuana is illegal, subjecting the businesses to the same issues.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was no suggestion that they\u2019re going to permit our clients who are here to continue their operations legally,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The government attorney did say, however, that rescheduling could make it more likely that banks would be willing to work with state-licensed cannabis businesses.<\/p>\n In general, the cannabis businesses have said in their lawsuit against the federal government that the prohibition of marijuana has \u201cno rational basis,\u201d pointing to officials\u2019 largely hands-off approach to the recent groundswell of state-level legalization.<\/p>\n At issue in the case is the degree to which in-state cannabis activity affects interstate commerce, with the government\u00a0arguing that cannabis legalization attracts out-of-state tourists<\/a>.<\/p>\n DOJ argued in a filing last month that \u201cit is rational to conclude that the regulated marijuana industry in Massachusetts fuels a different kind of marijuana-related interstate commerce: marijuana tourism.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAs the Supreme Court held decades ago, Congress has the authority to regulate businesses that cater to tourists from out of state, even if the businesses\u2019 transactions occur wholly in-state,\u201d DOJ said in the brief.<\/p>\n Plaintiffs, meanwhile, contend the Constitution\u2019s Commerce Clause should preclude DOJ from interfering in state-legal activity because it is regulated within a state\u2019s borders.<\/p>\n Boies also said at Wednesday\u2019s hearing that there\u2019s an argument to be made that \u201cthe net effect of legalizing it is to reduce\u201d illicit interstate cannabis commerce, in part because he argues that Massachusetts\u2019s regulatory framework effectively mitigates that risk.<\/p>\n In the background of the lawsuit, President Joe Biden\u00a0announced last week that his administration is formally moving to reschedule marijuana<\/a>, with a proposal published in the Federal Register this Tuesday to place cannabis in Schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).<\/p>\n Attorney General Merrick Garland, a chief defendant in the marijuana industry litigation, signed off on the proposed rule last Thursday. But reclassifying cannabis as Schedule III would not federally legalize it, so it seems unlikely that rulemaking will influence DOJ\u2019s position in the federal court case at hand.<\/p>\n Cannabis Use Before Bedtime Does Not Cause Next-Day Impairment Of Cognitive Ability Or Driving Performance, Study Shows<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo elements courtesy of rawpixel<\/a> and Philip Steffan<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post Marijuana Rescheduling Process \u2018Supports The Rationality\u2019 Of Federal Prohibition, DOJ Argues In Hearing On Cannabis Businesses\u2019 Lawsuit<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The federal government\u2019s move to reschedule marijuana \u201csupports the rationality\u201d of the overall law prohibiting cannabis, attorneys for the Justice Department argued in a court hearing on Wednesday. But both DOJ and major marijuana companies suing the government to try to block enforcement against their in-state activities generally agreed thatContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75521"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75521"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75521\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75522,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75521\/revisions\/75522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: Marijuana Rescheduling Process \u2018Supports The Rationality\u2019 Of Federal Prohibition, DOJ Argues In Hearing On Cannabis Businesses\u2019 Lawsuit<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"